This invention relates to the formation of cavities in blocks of packaging material, for the packaging of delicate products, and more particularly to cavity cutters of the hot wire type.
Hot wire cavity cutters have been proposed heretofore for producing in blocks of polystyrene foam or other similar material cavities which are shaped to confine a delicate product and thus provide a package by which to prevent damage to the product during shipment or other transport.
Such a hot wire cavity cutter is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,731,567. It involves the support of a packaging block for horizontal movement by a pusher member relative to a fixed, underlying hot wire die for a distance sufficient to cut the desired cavity shape into the block. The pusher thereafter engages the hot wire die, whereby simultaneously to move the block further horizontally and the hot wire die vertically downward to withdraw the hot wire die from the cut block, whereupon the scrap material cut from the block falls by gravity from the block.